Pfft. Ok. This story came from a derpy dream that I had where I was chasing Noel through a field. So. I don't have an editor and I'm just writing for fun. Tell me about any mistakes and, enjoy~

Lightning's abdominal muscles contracted as she pulled herself into a sitting position. "Where … am I?" she muttered, brushing the sand grains that clung to her clothing. It seemed she was on a beach. A very familiar beach.

"Oerba? Why am I in Oerba? I was just in… Val… halla…" she asked herself, glancing about her surroundings. Deciding that she wasn't going to figure anything out by sitting around and getting sand in her pants, Lightning stood up and began making her way towards a lush, green field.

And that was when she spotted a very oblivious Noel sitting on a row of rocks next to the ocean. Her eyes lit up dimly in faint excitement at finding a friendly soul to provide her with a few answers.

"Noel!" Light shouted, jogging towards him. He jumped a little and turned towards her, a confused expression enveloping his face.

"Who are you?" he asked, scrunching up his face, as if trying to remember. "You seem familiar,"

Lightning's jogging quickly slowed to a walk, which then slowed to a halt.

"What do you mean 'Who are you?' I met you in Valhalla." she said, crossing her arms in frustration. Noel's expression became one of worried shock.

"W-what do you mean? I was never in Valhalla." Noel stuttered, muscles tensing and eyes darting to and fro.

"Your time-gazing friend sent you as I was battling with Caius," she informed the increasingly-infuriating boy, eye beginning to twitch.

"Caius… oh god, you're one of them! I thought we stopped him a long time ago, but you're back!" Noel shouted, beginning to rise and stagger backwards.

"One of who? What are you talking about, Kreiss? It's me, Lightning. I gave you Mog as a good luck charm and asked you to bring Serah to me," she said, a bit of worry starting to trickle into her words.

"No! You're lying! I've never met you. Mog was a gift from Etro! Get away from here!" he hissed, stumbling over the rocks until reaching the field, where he began his mad dash towards Oerba.

"Noel, WAIT!" Lightning yelled, letting out an exasperated sigh. She quickly jumped over the boulders and began sprinting after him.

For a kid with pants loose enough to trip over, Noel was rather fast, and Lightning was having to put in near-maximum effort just to keep up. To get ahead, she really did have to put in maximum-effort.

Slowly but surely, as Noel neared a medium-sized house on the edge of Oerba, Lightning caught up to him. In an attempt to be rid of her, he grabbed her outstretched arm and tried to twist it behind her back before pushing her towards the ground. She used her other hand to spring herself back upwards, using the hand which Noel had grabbed to grasp his hair and push him to the ground. Lightning wasted no time in yanking his flailing towards her and pinning them behind his back as she sat on top of him, using her weight to keep him from escaping.

"Get OFF of me, you monster!" Noel shouted, kicking and thrashing enough to just about uproot Lightning. She whipped out her survival knife, and pressed the cold steel against the back of his head, before he really did throw her off.

"Stop thrashing or I will end your life right here, right now," she growled through clenched teeth, pressing the blade a little bit closer to the base of Noel's neck. It was an empty threat, really. She wouldn't dare harm the one who'd went through so much to bring her sister to her just because of a simple promise. Yet, she needed complete control of the situation in order to extract her answers easily and efficiently, and that required Noel being unable to call her bluff.

It seemed she had filled the statement with just enough venom, as the flailing body beneath her suddenly became limp.

"You win," he growled, "What do you want?"

"I just want a few an-" Lightning began, but was cut off as a thin, unknown object was pushed against the front of her throat. A strange feeling blade, but a potential threat nonetheless. She sighed again, raising her hands above her head and dropping the knife on the ground next to her.

"Didn't even have to give any instructions," a strangely nostalgic, but confused voice said. Before he even had time to react, Lightning spun around and launched herself towards him. Preparing for an attack, he attempted to ready his weapon, but was rendered utterly unprepared for what happened next.

"Hope!" the strange woman squeaked, jumping towards him and wrapping her arms around his neck in a tight, breath-stopping hug.

Confused and blushing furiously, said Hope couldn't decide whether this was a trick, and he should push the girl off of him, or whether he should simply enjoy the rare occasion that a member of the opposite sex chose to embrace him. Before he was able to reach a decision, though, it was made for him as Noel ripped the woman from him, leaving him feeling oddly empty and cold.

"Don't touch him!" Noel hissed, coming to stand in between of the slightly miffed Lightning and flushed Hope.

"Ok, I don't know what's going on here, but I'm just as confused as you two are… if not more," Hope said, eyes darting between the two death-glaring each other.

Lightning's angered expression melted into defeat as she put her hands in the sky and said, "There's a gunblade in the holster behind my thighs and another hunting knife tucked in my right boot."

Looking surprised, Noel quickly unclipped the holster and nabbed the knife just under the rim of her tall buckled boots. He gave her a quick and awkward pat-down, avoiding quite a few areas across her body.

"I say… we trust her. There's something strangely familiar about her, though I can't seem to put my finger on it…" Hope muttered, quizzically staring into Lightning's icy cerulean eyes.

She stared right on back, marveling at how much, yet how little Hope had changed in the 10 years that they'd all been gone. He was still the same awkward yet adorable little kid, but held the rough exterior of the man he'd slowly evolved into. His untamed silver hair was even more wild than it had been before, signifying a couple of sleepless nights and disregarded hair care. His light, green eyes still seemed to shine with boyish wonder. He was still the same curious kid as before, albeit more intelligent and, well… handsome. She couldn't deny the obvious growth spurt the kid had had. He was now lean, yet muscular enough to be attractive yet not… Overbearingly gigantic, much like Snow. His face had lost the small amount of chub from when he was just 14, and was that a bit of stubble Lightning saw?

Blinking, she pushed those thoughts to the back of her mind as the boy.. no, man she'd just been reunited with, discussed her fate with a certain dark-haired cynic who hadn't changed a bit since the last time she'd met him.

"I suppose we could bring her in for questioning," Noel agreed, looking back towards the woman who was slowly growing impatient.

"I'd be glad to answer your questions, but my arms are getting tired. Do you think we could sit down and do this?" Lightning muttered, glancing between the two.

Hope nodded and motioned for her to follow him inside the house, Noel falling into step behind her to make sure she didn't throw anyone to the ground again.

Sitting down at a small table in the dining room, Hope motioned for her to sit across from him. Noel leaned against the wall behind her, arms crossed and eyes narrowed.

"Now, can you tell me your name, miss?" Hope asked, speaking in a confident, even tone, as if he'd done this interrogation business before.

"My name is Lightning Farron. Sister of Serah Farron and former Guardian Corps lieutenant." she replied in an equally even tone. She didn't know if Hope had done this kind of thing before, but she knew she had.

"That would explain the uniform and the hair, but still, more questions arise. Can you tell me how you knew my name, and why you hugged me?" he asked, his calm tone faltering just slightly towards the end of his question. Lightning would bet her saber that he'd never interrogated anyone who'd attacked his friend and then proceed to hug him afterwards before. The ghost of a smirk tugged at her lips for merely a second at the amusing though.

"And mine," Noel supplied, eyes locked on the back of Lightning's head.

"Well, to answer this I might as well answer all of your soon-to-come questions at once. So, I'll start at the beginning. You may not believe me, but I'm simply relaying my memories back to you." she said, proceeding to inform them of adventures she, Hope, and their other friends had had as l'Cie, in order to save Cocoon and return Serah and Dajh from crystal stasis. Then she proceeded to tell them how she'd been dragged off of the Pulsian plane by Etro, in order to be the goddess' champion. She told them of how Caius Ballad had been trying to murder the goddess, to bring ultimate, never-ending chaos to the world. Lightning mentioned how one day, Noel had showed up. Falling from the Historia Crux, she'd caught him and asked him to bring her sister, the aforementioned Serah, to her.

She finished her story by telling them of how Caius vanished and she started to turn to crystal once more upon Etro's throne, her last memory being of the world slipping into chaos.

"The first time I disappeared was on the a plane of Pulse, beneath Cocoon's crystal pillar, when Etro changed the timeline and your memories had all been changed to believe that I was trapped in crystal stasis, along with Vanille and Fang within the pillar. It could be that you all managed to restore the timeline to it's true path, but your memories of me were erased in the process. I think that I must have emerged from crystal stasis just a few hours ago, into this timeline where I didn't exist, because it was shifted onto the right track while I was in Valhalla. Being in Valhalla is the equivalent to not existing at all, do you understand what I'm saying?"

Hope began to slowly nod. "It's a lot to take in, but what your saying seems very possible. I guess we should tell you our version of the story. It's basically everything that you said happened, just… without you in it. Though, we managed to save the world from falling into chaos when Noel and Serah turned Caius to crystal and Etro awoke, taking her Heart of Chaos back. Noel was unable to travel back to his time, and so he now stays with us."

"What I'm thinking, though, is that there's a paradox occurring from the effects of the timeline changing so quickly, that's making everyone forget about me. If we can maybe solve the paradox, then the timeline will finally be on the 100% absolute true course," Lightning hypothesized, meeting Hope's jade gaze.

"Alright, then… Lightning. I guess it's time for you to meet the family."